A Rift in Time
by inaudibleDIN
Summary: Fen'Harel had been content to live as a god among the Elvhen for thousands of years. This is the story of the slave who dismantled that complacency and inspired a revolution and how, together, they managed to shake the very fabric of time itself. [After he is captured, Alexius sends Lavellan back in time where she encounters a very different Solas and a very disappointing Arlathan]
1. Chapter 1

**Fen'Harel had been content to live as a god among the Elvhenan for thousands of years. This is the story of the slave who shook that complacency and inspired a revolution. **

* * *

**A/N: **Sahlin Lavellan is the same Inquisitor featured in my A World Shaken storyline, and [once it's finished] this story should fit tidily between chapters 11 and 12 of that series, but A Rift in Time is intended to stand alone as its own piece.

This is very much the product of being snowed in and bored out of my mind, so let me know what you think about the premise. Also, I'm taking a lot of liberties with the elvish since there is so little to go on. There's a glossary at the bottom, if you're interested, but I've made an effort to provide in-text translations for anything you actually need to understand.

Clarification: During chapters in which two Elvhen characters are speaking to one another, they are speaking elvish. It's fairly self-explanatory as you read and I trust you'd have figured that out, but it never hurts to clarify.

**Rated T for now, may shift to M in later chapters.**

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**Chapter One**

Sahlin Lavellan shifted in the enormous monstrosity of a chair, certain she looked absolutely ridiculous: a Dalish elf sitting on a throne. The very notion of it was preposterous, even to her. A Qunari at least would have managed to fill out the massive seat. As it was, Sahlin was forced to sit perched at the very end of what had to be the least forgiving cushion her backside had ever crested just to prevent her feet from dangling beneath her like a child's. The elf grit her teeth, suppressing the urge to shift again; she could still hear the ambassador's warning ringing between her ears: "_Remember, you must not fidget. That _is_ fidgeting, my lady. Now put your feet here. No, not like that. Here."_ Her eyes found Josephine standing apart from the crowd, just to the right of the throne's dais. The ambassador caught her gaze and gave her a quick, assuring nod. They believed in her. Josephine, Leliana, even the commander in his unique way, believed in her; they had elected her to serve as the leader of their Inquisition. And though she had agreed, Sahlin couldn't help but wonder now if she might have reconsidered, had they told her the Inquisitor was also responsible for sitting in judgment of their captives, for passing sentences and doling out punishments. It was one thing to defend herself against an assailant, to kill a man who charged at her; it was quite another to see a man in chains on his knees before her and decide him still deserving of death.

Directly across from her, at the far end of the hall, Skyhold's massive doors were being drawn open. The sound of wood scraping against metal echoed through the Great Hall, signaling that the time for contemplations and second-guessing was over. Sahlin straightened herself one last time and sucked in a deep breath. Almost in unison, heads began to turn as those who gathered to watch the proceedings strained to get their first glimpse of the prisoner. Sahlin's gaze moved to follow the others, but the feeling of a pair of eyes still upon her drew her attention from the doors. She found him standing straight-backed amid the Inquisition forces, grey-blue eyes watching her with a wry glint, wholly indifferent to the retinue of guards escorting the imprisoned magister through the Hall. As her eyes met his, he held her gaze with such intensity, such confidence, that for a moment, she forgot to breathe.

_A hand pressed against her waist, drawing her back into his embrace. A look, a single look of warning and wanting, of better judgment and not caring. Then his fingers were in her hair, hard and calloused, cradling her cheek, slipping beneath her chin, tilting her lips toward his. His mouth on hers, warm and soft and devouring, taking the breath from her chest, demanding still more. And then, nothing. Hands pushing her away. Another look, of longing and regret, of better judgment restored._

_"Solas?" she barely breathed his name, lungs still wanting for air._

_"We shouldn't." His veneer returned, quiet and confident, superior. "It isn't right, not even here."_

"You recall Gereon Alexius of Tevinter."

Sahlin jumped at the sound of the ambassador's voice, and she could feel the color rushing to her cheeks. Of all the times to be caught daydreaming! She could only hope no one else had noticed. The Inquisitor forced the Fade-memory from her thoughts and turned her attention to the magister, kneeling before her. Gereon Alexius. She had expected to see the righteous curl of his upper lip or the deranged light in his eyes, but the magister's head was bowed low, obscuring his dark features. Still, she could live a thousand lifetimes and never forget that face.

"Ferelden has given him to us in acknowledgement of your aid," Josephine continued. If she had noticed the Inquisitor's lapse in focus, she didn't let on. "The formal charges are apostasy, attempted enslavement, and attempted assassination—on your own life, no less. Tevinter has disowned and stripped him of his rank. You may judge the former magister as your see fit."

Sahlin dropped her chin just barely, thanking the ambassador for her heraldry. Josephine responded with a slight bow of her own and then stepped back from the dais. It was all a practiced routine. Days earlier, Josephine had spent hours schooling her on trial decorum, the expected gestures and statements. For her part, Sahlin had listened, trying to remember the series of movements and responses the ambassador rattled off. For her part, Sahlin hoped she had performed sensibly enough, and a quick glance at Josephine told her she had. The ambassador was not smiling openly, but Sahlin could see feel the approval in her look. It was all the encouragement she needed.

The Inquisitor returned her attention to Alexius, and a new sense of certainty took hold in her. This was one trial that didn't require any hesitation or second-guessing. He would have killed them all, given the chance, but not before he had tortured the men and women she had come to think of as family, not before he had snuffed out the fire in Leliana's eyes and silenced the melody of Solas's voice. She would not lose sleep over sentencing the magister to a quicker death than he deserved.

Sahlin's eyes never once left the Alexius, but when she spoke, she was careful to raise her voice loudly enough for the throng to hear. "I remember what would have happened to Thedas," she said, "if your teachery had succeeded." I remember the red lyrium growing from the castle walls, she wanted to scream at him. I remember the torture chambers and the demons. I remember watching my friends die. I remember it all. The words beat against her lips, wanting to be heard. But she refused to give the magister that satisfaction, to let him know how profoundly his nightmarish future still haunted her dreams.

At the base of the dais, Alexius raised his gaze to meet hers but it was a blank, emotionless stare that looked back at her. "I couldn't save my son," the Tevinter replied, tone as vacant as his eyes. "Do you think my fate matters to me?"

Sahlin could not have cared less what did or did not matter to him, but Josephine had already prepared her for this moment, for what she was to say in return. "Will you offer nothing more in your defense?" she asked with as much indifference as she could inflect on the words.

The magister's balding head hung low, ignoring her. Sahlin was prepared to continue, to take his silence as a concession, when Alexius abruptly looked up. The blank look in his eyes had receded, replaced with a sharp hatred, and the Inquisitor allowed the faintest smile to trace her lips; it was a feral, victorious grin. She wanted to see the hatred in him, to know that he realized how entirely he had failed.

"You've won nothing," the magister spat, lashing out like a wounded mabari. "The people you saved, the acclaim you gathered, you'll lose it all in the storm to come." Alexius's voice rose with each word until the magister was on his feet. Sahlin's pulse increased with the tempo of the magister's words, and she could already see the Inquisition guards moving to subdue their prisoner. Alexius lunged forward as they closed on him. "You'll lose it all…_now_!" he shouted.

Sahlin leapt from the throne, reaching for the staff at her back that wasn't there. Screams filled the Great Hall, and she was vaguely aware of the throng stampeding for the door as the sound of an explosion filled her ears. The floor beneath her shook and the room seemed to fold in on itself. Sahlin reached out, grasping in all directions as the ground gave way beneath her. Alexius was no longer in sight, and she was falling backwards into blackness, careening into a silence so deafening it drowned out the shouts, the explosion, everything.

Her shoulder hit the ground first and Sahlin was sure she heard something snap just before she felt her face collide with the stone floor. Then she was hurtling, legs over shoulders, arms over feet, head over heels down a flight of stairs. She grasped desperately for something—anything—to hold onto but her head spiraled, spinning in and out of focus. Everything was covered in snow; the walls of Skyhold were gone. And then, without warning, the world went black.

**o – o – o – o - o**

"You're going to like this, brother." Andruil fingered the tip of an arrow, her brown-almost-black eyes watching him from over its point.

Fen'harel lifted a brow but did not bother to look up from his reading. He rarely cared for matters brought to his attention by Andruil, though that hardly seemed to abate her pestering. There were times when he feared they had walked this earth for too long already, that they were each going mad in their own unique way, the huntress most of all.

"Won't you ask me what I know?" Andruil pursed her lips into a pout that was more unbecoming than it was enticing, but he knew the woman well enough to realize she would not leave until she had spoken her piece.

"What is it then?" he growled, gaze still fixed on the page before him. "What do you know?"

"One of mother's slaves dropped out of the sky this morning. Well, I suppose the priests say she fell from the Fade, but what do they know anyway?" For the first time, Fen'harel looked up at her, mouth half-agape. That earned him a quick smirk from the huntress before she turned to leave. "I thought that would capture your attention," she teased. Andruil's voice echoed through the corridor as she made her way to the Eluvian. "Oh, and by the way, mother is asking for you."

Fen'harel had slammed his book shut long before he heard the last of her words. _Dropped out of the sky?_ For once, the Dread Wolf made haste to follow after the huntress.

**o – o – o – o - o**

The world came crashing back into existence all at once, too bright and too loud. Sahlin clenched her eyes shut, pressing a hand against her temples. Everything hurt. She was vaguely aware of voices talking somewhere nearby, but they were too loud or too wrong for her to make out anything coherent. Was that elvish? She tried to hold onto the words, but the world was already going black again…

When Sahlin awoke for the second time, the pain was duller and the world felt softer. She was able to open her eyes and keep them open and, slowly, the room around her came into focus. At first, she could just barely make out its colors and shapes: a pale wall here, a bright chair there. Above her, the ceiling was a swirl of translucent blues and whites. She knew that couldn't be right. Her thoughts ached. _Everything_ ached. All around her, the room was a blur. Shadows and flashes of color ran together like paint made with too much water.

"Dirthara-man na tel'shiral Elgar'Inan, din'rivas."

The words tore through her like an arrow through the skull and for a moment, Sahlin thought the world would go black again. But this time, the colors and shadows remained, lingering just within her vision.

Another voice was speaking, this one softer and more bearable than the first. "Dar atisha, ma'len," it said.

Sahlin struggled to make out the words, but they were too quick and the accent too foreign. It sounded like some form of elvish. But the few words she did understand refused to make sense; it was as if someone had flipped open the Keeper's dictionary and selected words at random to shove together. Her head throbbed. The two women—she was fairly certain both voices belonged to women—continued their exchange in their all-wrong elvish, but Sahlin could already feel the edges of her vision beginning to cloud again.

"The Great Hall…" she stuttered, trying to hold onto what shred of consciousness she had left. It was such a vague memory, but she was sure it was somehow important. Skyhold, the Inquisition, Alexius. Her eyes widened as the memories returned. "The explosion!" she gasped. There had been an explosion at Skyhold, she was sure of it now.

"Da'asha dirth shemlen?" It was the first woman again, the one with the loud, piercing voice.

Sahlin squinted in the direction of the shadow she thought belonged to the speaker. It was little more than a dark wisp of black, but Sahlin thought if she could make out any details, the woman would be glaring at her. None of it made any sense.

"_Dirth shem-len?"_ the dark wisp spoke slower this time, annunciating each word. The pronunciations still grated against her ears and the words didn't seem to fit together properly, but Sahlin finally thought she understood the question.

"Yes," she whispered—it hurt less if she whispered, "yes, I am. I'm speaking shem." Speaking shem, it sounded absurd; she spoke Common, like everyone else at Skyhold. Her heart missed a beat. This wasn't Skyhold. The realization fell on her like a weight of bricks. This wasn't Skyhold. But then where was she? Tevinter? That would explain the strange accents. This wasn't Skyhold.

Across the room, the shadow-figures had all started talking at once, the two women and a man now as well. She thought the new voice sounded vaguely familiar, but it was impossible to tell with the accent and the speed at which they spoke. Sahlin strained her ears, listening. It wasn't Tevene. She was sure of it. Whatever they were speaking it was some broken, mottled form of elvish. That calmed her somewhat, but it still didn't explain where she was.

"Where did you get this amulet?" It was the man who spoke, this time in Common. More importantly, she knew that voice.

Sahlin strained to find its source, to make out anything more than foggy shadows. How did she know that voice? It was a distant memory, a melody lingering just beyond her reach. The shadow that belonged to him was moving closer, until it stood almost directly in front of her. She could just barely make out the dark grey of his robes, lined with silver embroidery. Beyond his robes the other two shadows were coming into focus as well: one was still little more than a black wisp, the other a slightly more corporeal blue figure.

"Do you understand me?" the grey robes shifted as the man in front of her bent down, bringing his face nearer to hers. His appearance sharped enough for her to make out long, red-brown hair and a pale, angular face. Sahlin strained to make out more details, but there was another flash of grey as his hand moved, drawing her attention with it. "Where did you get this?"

She squinted at the object, but it was oscillating back and forth in his grasp, a black and yellow blur that could have been anything. She gave up on the object and turned her attention back to the man holding it. She knew him somehow, she was certain. If she could just make out—

"Look at it, da'len," he said. And the memory fell into place.

"Solas." Sahlin barely breathed the word, but she knew it was true. The voice was his, it had to be. The accent was different, harder somewhow, and he spoke more quickly than usual, but there was no mistaking it now. The man crouched in front of her was Solas.

"A pride demon?" he remarked. But Sahlin was no longer listening. She could feel the tears burning against her cheeks and relief swelling in her chest. She was still in Skyhold. The injury to her head must have been severe, but if Solas was with her, it would only be a matter of time before he and the Inquisition healers managed to repair her injuries and return her to new.

Sahlin closed her eyes, certain it would be safe enough to sleep, if only for a little while longer…

"A _demon_ gave this to you?" Solas demanded, so loudly it threatened to split her head in two.

A demon? What was he talking about? Sahlin forced herself to open her eyes once more. Solas's blurred face still lingered just in front of hers, shrouded in a reddish brown. Was that hair? It was getting harder to think, but Solas was speaking again, his voice higher now, more urgent.

"How were you able to enter the Fade?" His tone set her nerves on edge. If Solas refused to let her rest, then something must have gone terribly wrong.

Sahlin swallowed a deep breath and braced herself. She needed to sit up, to clear her head. Solas was still crouched in front of her, and she moved to brace herself against him. She lifted a hand to his shoulder and used her other hand to hold onto his arm, hauling herself up.

"Solas, stop," she panted, blinking back the searing pain that tore through her skull. "You're not making any sense. What demon?" If she thought the black wisp was loud, her own voice was almost deafening as it ricocheted between her ears. "Where's Cassandra?"

Solas's arm tensed beneath her fingers, and Sahlin raised her gaze to his. She could just barely make out his eyes. They were the same, intense grey-blue she remembered, but the similarities stopped there. There was nothing of Solas in that look; the eyes that met hers were hard and threatening, dangerous. Sahlin froze.

"You go too far, slave," Solas whispered.

Without warning, Solas grabbed hold of the hand she had rested on his arm and wrenched it back. The corners of her vision darkened in pain and Sahlin hoped she was fighting against him. Somewhere, far away, she felt like she was, like she was kicking and screaming for him to let her go. But the world was going black again and she could feel herself falling, falling…

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**TRANSLATIONS**

Dirthara-man na tel'shiral Elgar'Inan, din'rivas: May that teach you not to venture into the Spirit World, slave.

Dar atisha, ma'len: Be easy, my child

Da'asha dirth shemlen?: The girl speaks the language of the humans?


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"The girl is obviously mad."

Andruil lounged restlessly against a pillar, a dead fox clutched in one hand, a skinning knife in the other. The huntress spoke to no one in particular; it was little more than an idle thought, uttered aloud as her fingers deftly navigated her blade beneath the fox's pelt, hewing away at the muscles and tendons still holding its hide in place. It was a distraction, nothing more, a means to occupying her hands and her thoughts while they waited. There was a time when the huntress would have considered it an outrage to steal another creature's soul for her own amusement, to snuff out its life without reason. But so much had changed over the last millennia, the huntress included. Their race was quickening with the advent of the shemlen in the north, and there were those among the humans who were developing the gifts of the Fade. Everything, it seemed, stood on the precipice of change and rather than rising to meet the revolution that awaited them, they were slipping further and further into the darkest parts of themselves.

From where he sat, Fen'harel could see the same anxious lines of impatience etched across the faces of the others, his adopted brethren. Change was indeed upon them and a summoning of the entire pantheon was no longer a common occurrence. Many of those who had gathered were growing uncomfortable in the presence of their ever-silent All-Father. Elgar'nan himself seemed not to hear the idle chatter of his many children. He so rarely did. The man reclined easily against his high-backed throne, looking every bit the image of a god. His black hair hung in dreaded locks well past the middle of his back, and his cool eyes—almost as black as Andruil's—stared out across the empty welcoming hall, the Andaran'an of his own Temple, as though it were crowded with worshippers still, come to behold him in all his stately glory. But it had been centuries since the People had visited their Makers in throngs, crowding their Temples, clamoring for the adoration or protection of those who had raised them to immortality.

"Mad or not," Dirthamen said, jarring Fen'harel from his thoughts, "if what the priests say is true, the slave certainly warrants some inspection." The secret-master stood behind his throne, pale hands resting idly against its marbled back. "Even Falon'din does not possess such an ability. Imagine—"

"Yes," Andruil cut in, "where is your better half, brother? Surely his insight would be of more value on this matter."

Dirthamen shrank under Andruil's triumphant glare, and Fen'harel supposed the secret-master had somehow managed to earn the huntress's disfavor of late. They were caught in an eternal triangle of exchanged affections and hurt feelings, the huntress and the dread twins. Ghilan'nain eyed the pair of them from the seat of Andruil's throne, her expression impassive. It had taken the halla-mother centuries to master that look, to mask the defeat and jealousy in her eyes each time Andruil took a new lover. In time, Fen'harel knew the huntress would return to her and, in time, Ghilan'nain would accept her lover once again without reservation. Entire races rose and fell, civilizations flickered into existence only to expire centuries later, mountains grew and crumbled, streams ran full and dried, and still their endless spats remained the same.

"She is not wrong."

June's voice was low at Fen'harel's ear, barely a whisper. The dread-wolf kept his gaze fixed on the amulet strung between his fingers, trying to shake the thoughts of the past and the imminence of their future from his mind. The craftsman had a point, for once Andruil was right. Falon'din should have arrived already. There were six members of the pantheon already gathered in Elgar'nan's great temple. Mythal, the All-Mother, and Sylaise, the healer, still remained with the slave. Only Falon'din's absence was unexcused.

Fen'harel shifted in his seat, trying to find a more comfortable perch between its sharp edges. In truth, the throne belonged to June, but the craftsman was rarely capable of sitting still long enough to occupy it, so Fen'harel had claimed the seat as his own. His long legs were draped carelessly across one armrest, while his back reclined against the other. June, meanwhile, sat at the dread-wolf's back, observing his kin.

"Is it true?" the craftsman continued in his half-whisper. "About the mark on the slave's hand, that it pulses with the magic of the Fade?"

Fen'harel lowered the amulet. He could still feel the sensation of the slave's hand against his chest and the potency of the magic its mark held. Hers was a magic too rapidly receding from this world, a sympathetic form that resonated with the rhythms of the Fade. Yes, he thought in response to June's question, it was true. But there had been something intimate about that touch as well, something that had nothing to do with a slave's audacity to reach out a hand to her Maker, unbidden. It was not his memory to share, he decided. To the craftsman at his back, he merely shrugged.

"I do not know," he said, "perhaps it is—"

"Oh she _is_ a feisty one!" Falon'din's voice filled the Andaran'an, eclipsing Fen'harel's hushed words.

The death-lord made his way across Elgar'nan's Temple, followed closely by Sylaise and Mythal, a juxtaposition that gave him an even more sinister appearance than usual. Falon'din's dark hair danced out behind him with the speed of his gait, mixing with the folds of his black cloak, and making it impossible to tell where one ended and the other began. Behind him, Sylaise appeared wearier than usual, her normally pleasant countenance knotted in concern. Even Mythal seemed somewhat lost in thought. It did not bode well for the slave, Fen'harel thought, that the death-lord alone among the healer and the All-Mother, looked pleased.

"Go on then," Andruil called to Falon'din, "tell us what you know, as you have obviously been with the slave while the rest us waited here at father's request." The huntress's dark eyes glared at her brother and then at the half-skinned carcass in her hand. With a huff, she tossed the animal aside and rubbed her hands against her breeches.

"Who better than I to investigate a curiosity of the Fade, sister?" Falon'din replied, a contorted smirk upon his lips. "When I received father's message, I knew mother would desire my counsel."

June snorted, just barely bothering to stifle a laugh. It was already known among the members of the pantheon that Mythal had sent for the dread-wolf and not Falon'din when the slave was first discovered. For his part, Fen'harel merely smiled. He and Falon'din agreed so rarely on matters of the Fade that he sometimes wondered whether they even walked the same realm.

Next to them, the death-lord tossed back his black cloak and slid into the seat of his throne with all the regality of Elgar'nan himself. "You should know, brother," he sneered, "our mother and sister were fortunate I was there. Sylaise was far too generous in her ministrations. When our dear sister finished healing the slave, the wretch awoke and began attacking on site. She left a servant and two slaves frozen solid and a third slave dead. I was able to subdue her, of course, and she has been banded. Even that mark on her hand is inert now."

"So it _is_ a mark from the Fade, then?" Ghilan'nain asked. Fen'harel arced a brow; he had almost forgotten the lyrical sound of the halla-mother's voice. It had been decades since he had heard her speak.

"Of course it is," Falon'din retorted. "How else could a slave manage to escape?"

Fen'harel was pondering what exactly it was that the slave needed to escape from, when June gave voice to his thoughts.

"Escape from what?" the craftsman laughed. "I doubt tumbling down a mountainside and drawing the attention of the entire pantheon constitutes an escape from anything!"

Falon'din leaned forward, poised to retaliate, when Mythal intervened.

"From her time, my son," the All-Mother said. That caught his attention. The dread-wolf and his kin gaped at Mythal, trying to make sense of her words. To their collective confusion, the All-Mother explained, "The girl is a slave, it is true, and I imagine she is one of my own, though not yet." Fen'harel's mouth was already open when Mythal raised a hand to silence their questioning. Though not yet? "The slave's grasp on our language is rudimentary at best. She speaks primarily in the language of the shemlen. No, Andruil, I do not believe it to be a ruse." Across the chamber, the huntress crossed her arms with a huff. Even she shrank beneath the All-Mother's knowing gaze. "The girl's hair is cropped shorter than any of the People, even a slave, would dare," Mythal continued. "And although the blood writing on her face is my own, it is embellished in a fashion I have never seen." Mythal paused a moment, apparently lost in her own thoughts. When she continued, she shook her head, as if to assure herself her explanation was the only possible one. "No," she said, "I daresay the slave is not of our time, but rather from a period that has not yet come to pass, perhaps from a moment in time she wanted to escape, or possibly to improve her lot in this world. Regardless, the girl's justification for traipsing across time is irrelevant. Our first concern must be in understanding how she was able to achieve such a thing."

Fen'harel could only stare at the All-Mother, his thoughts reeling. To his left, Falon' din smiled out at his kin in victory, chest swelling with the importance of having been made privy to Mythal's information long before his siblings.

"You are certain of this?" Elgar'nan asked, his voice reverberating across the Andaran'an like thunder through a valley. The All-Father would have likely dismissed any of his children who made such a claim, but for all his harsher qualities, he trusted in Mythal.

The All-Mother inclined her head. "I am as certain as I can be," she said. "The girl has said little but to object that she is not a slave and that she has been displaced in time. While I would expect the first of any runaway, the latter does offer some explanation for an unlikely number of realities. I will not pretend to know how it is possible, but I would like to find out."

"And what of the amulet that appeared with her?" June asked. "Surely that cannot be coincidence."

"The demon's amulet, you mean?" Andruil spoke up, eager to prove she was also privy to information the others were not. "I suppose a spirit could contrive—"

"There was no demon," Sylaise interrupted, earning a vicious glare from the huntress. "The 'Solas' the girl spoke of is a name, not a demon, I believe. In fact, I think she may have thought Fen'harel was this person. Perhaps he bears your mischievous look, brother." Sylaise smiled warmly at Fen'harel, and it was comforting to see her returned to her usual composure.

The innocence of her jest, however, was lost on Elgar'nan. "If the slave knows the dread-wolf well enough to name him for his pride," the All-Father grumbled, "perhaps she is of our time after all, and as great a charlatan as the wolf himself." Fen'harel felt his ears burn red, and neither the dark twins for Andruil could stifle their laughing. But Elgar'nan was in no mood for frivolity, even that born of his own ill will. "Enough," he growled, effectively silencing his children. "We have speculated far longer than necessary. Bring in the slave and lets us be done with this."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: **Okay, so I'm now splitting what was supposed to be one chapter into _three_. But it's all good. We'll move on eventually. I promise.

Personally, I think this chapter is a bit boring (which is probably why it took me so long to wade through), but it's necessary. There are a lot of moving parts I want to line up just right to assure that this little romp through time actually makes sense when everything is said and done.

Fortunately, we'll finally be getting into some real character interaction in the next chapter. Thanks for bearing with me, and I hope now that I've managed to wrap my mind around the more difficult logistical kinks, this should roll along more quickly.

A note on translations: If it's in elvish, a translation should be provided in-text already. Holler at me if you find anything missing.

And last, but not least, a continued **THANK YOU** to those who have reviewed this story. Really, that spurs me on and keeps me writing more than anything. So **thank you, thank you, thank you!** And Asilyessam, you pretty much just described my dream job, so I'm definitely with ya there! Totally possible, right? ;)

* * *

**Chapter Three**

Sahlin staggered across the threshold of the Eluvian, gasping for breath. _A real, intact Eluvian. Here. _In her mind, questions collided with more questions, and her head was left spinning under the weight of it all. _A working Seeing Glass_. She could still feel its magic rippling against her skin, enveloping her, drawing her through to the other side. _But to where? _Only moments ago, they had been in an open, airy chamber with windows and birds singing outside. Now, there was only stone, a long narrow corridor that seemed to stretch on forever. Stone, guards, and more stone; that was all there was to see. It was becoming something of a habit of hers, waking up in these situations without any notion as to the _how _or _why_ or _where _or _when_, and she was growing weary of piecing together incoherent fragments just to make sense of her own life.

"Ven, din'rivas" one of the guards—she'd already named him Grumpy—snapped, his face emerging through the Eluvian ahead of his feet; Grumpy was not by any definition—in elvish or Common—a patient man. But Sahlin could not bring herself to move, not yet. Her eyes remained fixed on the rippling pool of magic that stood like glass between the mirror's great frames. It was two stories high at least and more magnificent than any drawing in Keeper Deshanna's books. But more than that, it was _real_, an actual Seeing Glass, a portal that moved men from one place to another. The books had speculated and suggested, but to actually _experience_ it…_Creators, it was real._

A rough hand closed over her shoulder, forcing her around. Sahlin craned her neck, fighting against the hand, trying to memorize as much of the mirror as she could. _An Eluvian_. Who knew when she'd ever see such a treasure again?

"Mala, din'rivas," Grumpy growled behind her. "Ven." This time, he gave her shoulder a swift shove just to assure his meaning wasn't lost completely on her uncomprehending ears.

But she'd understood him well enough the first time. _Move_, he'd said_, move now_. It was the other word—_din'rivas_—that left her stomach in knots and slowed her feet to a drag. Literally, the term meant _not free_. It hadn't taken her long, though, to learn that—among these elves—a more accurate translation was _slave_. It was yet another piece in what was turning out to be an ever-expanding, absurd puzzle; and this was one piece she was certain she'd rather leave out entirely. _Slave_. The word set her teeth on edge and sent little bumps rippling across her skin.

But Grumpy's hands were on her again, urging her forward, down the corridor. Begrudgingly, Sahlin tore her gaze from the Eluvian and willed her feet to follow. There were six of them in all, the same guards who had been summoned to stand watch over her after the incident in the cottage. In truth, she had no idea whether the place from before had been a cottage or not, but it felt cottagey enough, with its big rooms and bright windows. As for the incident, though … the attack—the _murder_, she thought bitterly—that had been a mistake, and she'd known it the moment the mana left her fingers. It was been pure reflex, impulse; at least, that was what she kept telling herself. She'd awoken in the cottage with the feeling of his hands still on her—the elf who was not Solas; she could feel his hold on her wrists, and hear his voice echoing between her ears: "_You go too far, slave_." The magic welled inside her almost unbidden, fighting back, straining to be free of him. But when she finally opened her eyes, it wasn't his face she saw, and they weren't his dead eyes staring back at her. The elf was dressed in a loose shirt and pale breeches, his large eyes wide and uncomprehending, frozen solid like the rest of him. He held a flask of water in his outstretched hand, offering it to her.

Sahlin wanted to bury the memory, to push it from her mind. But every time she blinked, his face was staring back at her. She tried to tell herself there would be plenty of time to dwell on her crimes soon enough; there was no need to bother replaying the incident in her mind. No one had actually bothered to explain anything to her, but it seemed fairly apparent she was being led to some trial, or prison, or execution. And at that particular moment, she wasn't even sure which she thought she deserved. _Eyes frozen solid, staring back at her._ Sahlin shook her head, and tried to focus on the guards walking in front of her: Whitey and Lackey Number One, she called them. Whitey's long, white hair swept against his ass as he walked, like the pendulum of a clock. _Just like Josephine's_. The thought brightened her spirits somewhat; she even had to suppress a little chuckle at the thought. But even that felt wrong, a dishonor to the memory of the elf with the flask.

"Keep up," Whitey grumbled ahead of her. She had slowed somewhat, tired and scared and lost in thought; it was a lot to keep up with. But Sahlin made an effort to quicken her pace, not caring to delay whatever _this_ was any longer.

If there was a leader among her escorts, it was almost certainly Whitey, followed more than likely by Grumpy. Of the six men assigned to the little retinue, only those two had the bearings of men in charge. The Three Lackeys, meanwhile, looked every bit the soldiers, and Sahlin had no doubt they were great in a scuffle and dreadful at chess. Only Sad Eyes didn't seem to fit the uniform he wore; the man looked more like a halla to her than a soldier or a captain. His big round eyes reminded her of the halla her father tended back home: honest, and simple, and kind. It made his vallaslin seem all the more strange. Like the other five men, Sad Eyes wore the mark of Elgar'nan upon his face. It wasn't uncommon, necessarily. Even among the Dalish, the rowdier, pugnacious sorts always tended toward the God of Vengeance's mark. Her own brother had taken the All-Father's symbol for his vallaslin. But Sad Eyes hardly seemed the soldierly type, much less a man who would choose to mark himself as such.

But it was not Sad Eye's vallaslin that left her unsettled; it was those of the others, the marks worn by the elves in the cottage. She had to have encountered at least fifteen different elves during her time at the cottage and every one of them had borne the mark of Mythal: the women who stripped her bare to wash away the dirt and grime from her body, the silent ones who tended to her bandages after, the girl who helped her into a beige dress when her blood-soiled garments were taken away, the boy who brought in a trey of bread and water, the man frozen solid with a flask in his hand. Each and every one of them wore the blood writing of the All-Mother, even the healers. Somehow, that detail felt tremendously significant and yet no matter which way she turned it in her mind, it was still just another peculiarity amid a sea of nonsensical observations, another piece that refused to fit into a larger puzzle, _any_ puzzle.

There were few enough facts she could be sure of, and they all insisted on lining up wrong, on refusing to make any sense at all. She knew Alexius had found some means to attack in the Great Hall; that he'd worked his time magic again and that, somehow, he'd managed to send her back in time rather than forward. Of that she was also certain: this had to be the past, not the future. It was the only explanation for the frequency or—more accurately—the exclusivity with which the elves here spoke in their ancient tongue; and, of course there was the Eluvian as well. There were precious few Seeing Glasses left in her own time, and those she knew of had been shattered or inactivated long ago. This could only be the past, then. But how far back had she been sent? _To Elvhenan, to the time of Ancient Arlathan?_ She wanted to believe it could be true. But the Elvhen were a free and proud people who had had fought even to the extent of their own ruin against the tyranny and enslavement of Tevinter. No Elvhen of Elvhenan would call her slave; of that she was also certain. So where did that leave her? _Tevinter? The earliest days of the Imperium?_ But if that were true, where were all the humans?

None of it made any sense. None of the pieces fit together, and Sahlin cursed herself for not spending more time actually reading Deshanna's history books when she'd had the chance.

In front of her, Whitey and Lackey Number One finally stopped moving. Two by two, they each came to a halt behind them, standing just in front of a massive stone wall, twice as high as the Eluvian, and laced with intricate lyrium engravings. Vaguely, Sahlin knew she should be taking inventory of her surroundings: Where were the exits? How many weapons did each man carry? Which blade could she get her hands on? Who would be the easiest to kill?

But everything suddenly felt so _heavy_. The cuffs on her arms—a _banding_ one of the barefaced elves had called it—pulsed and tightened, leaving her head light and her arms heavy. It had been easier to ignore when they were walking, but almost the moment they had stopped, her legs threatened to give way beneath her. The bands were fastened one around each forearm, leeching the mana from her entirely, and her every muscle throbbed under the effort; even her veins ached as her body struggled to fight against the cuffs like a poultice against infection. But the bands tightened relentlessly; and the more strenuously her body fought to produce the mana it so desperately needed, the more forcefully it was sapped from her.

Sahlin was vaguely aware of Sad Eyes moving closer, but she no longer cared; her every thought was on holding herself upright, on not falling over. Then she felt his arm sliding in around her waist, lending her his strength, and despite herself, Sahlin felt her legs sagging against him, allowing him to support her weight, to keep her standing. _Just like a hall_a_. _

"Hamin, da'len," he whispered. _Rest_. Her thoughts clouded over and her legs felt as if they were melting beneath her. She decided she liked him, even if he was leading her to her execution, or her trial, or to some prison. To wherever. She was just so tired, and so heavy, and so tired… _Creators, how did it get this bad this fast?_

"Please, hahren," she murmured against Sad Eyes's chest. "Ma halani, _please_." Sahlin just barely lifted her arm, trying to indicate the bands, to explain her meaning, to make up for her inadequate grasp of their language. _Help me_.

But the guard only shook his head, the look in his eyes even more somber than before. "Ir abelas, da'len," he said. "Mala suledin nadas." _Now you must endure._ She had heard the phrase before, though it was one the Dalish rarely used.

It never meant anything good.

In front of them, she was just barely aware of Whitey and Grumpy tracing the lyrium engravings on the wall with their fingers, moving in a synchronous, almost dance-like rhythm. _Now you must endure_, Sad Eyes had said. _Endure what? _Creators, she was so _tired_ of enduring, of fighting, of being sent careening through time and rifts and the Fade. _So tired_.

But the wall before them was already coming to life, scraping stone against stone as the wall broke into two behemoth doors, yawning open. Whitey and Grumpy moved out of the way as the massive slats slid toward them, and in a matter of seconds what had previously been an almost seamless wall of stone was now a threshold large enough to accommodate giants.

"Suledin, da'len," Sad Eyes said beside her, and she could already feel his arm shifting, forcing her to stand on her own two feet again. "Ma'enansal ven in'ar." _Endure_, he told her, _may luck go with you._

Sahlin felt herself nodding and whispering her thanks, but her eyes were fixed on the threshold and the dark chamber that lingered beyond it. _So tired of enduring_.

"Ven, da'len," Sad Eyes whispered, moving away. "Ven mala." _Go now_.

An image flashed across her mind. _His eyes didn't understand. They watched her frozen in time, uncomprehending, the flask in his hand iced over like the rest of his lifeless body. _Sahlin willed herself to take a step forward, testing the strength in her legs. The short respite Sad Eyes had given her seemed to have served its purpose. Though her legs still throbbed under the leeching of the bands, she was sure they would hold her up. She took another step, and then another, and another. Her heels had barely crossed the massive threshold when she heard the doors behind her grating to a close.

_Don't look back_.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Holy mother of pearl. It's been a while. And as a bonus, I combined what probably should have wound up as two chapters into one, and we are FINALLY finished with this scene. Let the Solas-Lavellan, er Fen'Harel-Sahlin, interaction begin!

We'll finally get into some legitimate exchanges and plot developing between the pair of them, which is why you're reading, right? Right. Great.

I have a mission to get back in the swing of more regular updates. So stay tuned! **For any one reading this as well as A World Shaken, I'm putting that one on hold.** My goal is to finish this, and then I can work solely on AWS. There's a sequel to both that will better solidify how each story works together and also what happens post-Corypheus. But more on that in a while!

* * *

**Chapter Four**

It was a cavern, the chamber that lay beyond the stone doors. Massive and empty—and dark. Sahlin held out a hand and wiggled her fingers in front of her face. Nothing. The darkness devoured it all: sight and sound and direction. There were no hands or fingers or anything else to be seen. Only darkness. But the bands on her arms were tensing, already beginning to leech the mana from her body yet again. Sahlin could feel her knees weakening beneath her own weight, commanding her to keep moving. She ventured a step forward, and another after that, then another. The pain in her arms and legs lessened with each step forward and so, if for no reason than to remain standing, she walked, deeper and deeper into the darkness. _One step in front of the other_. At first, she stayed in a straight line, moving forward. When she tired of that and the bands tightened their hold against her once more, she turned to the right and walked in that direction. And when that grew old, she would change direction again. Forward. Backward. Sideways. It made no difference. She was walking for the sake of walking, and everything everywhere looked the same: an endless blackness. There was no floor and no ceiling, no walls or furniture; there was only the dark.

More than once it occurred to her that this was it. The end. Her prison. An immense blackness to fill the rest of her days until guilt drove her mad. They were distant thoughts, foggy, like in a dream. A part of her knew she should be doing something, anything, to improve her chances of survival, but those thoughts barely seemed real. More like a memory than an actual _thought_.

Sahlin staggered here and there for what felt like hours, but could have just as easily been minutes or days; she walked until her feet dragged against the stone with every step and her banded arms felt like weights ready to fall from their sockets; she marched deeper and deeper into the darkness until, eventually, one foot smacked into the other and sent her sprawling forward. Catching herself against the damp floor, Sahlin blinked out into the darkness. _This doesn't make any sense_. The thought clawed at the back of her mind, begging to be heard, impressing on her the need to find a way out. _Run, flee, now!_ a voice screamed inside her head. _Back to the door!_ The thoughts spilled forth like water through a broken dam, washing away the haziness of her black-dream, and soon Sahlin was urging her feet forward once more.

This time, she counted, tracing her steps, and being careful to avoid crossing the same path twice. Sooner or later, she had to find a wall or a door or…something. It took time, but after her third calculated turn, a light appeared beneath her feet.

Sahlin stopped, blinking, not entirely ready to believe her eyes. She stared at the light for a moment, terrified to look away, worried that if she did it would not still be there when she looked back. Then, just barely visible, another dull light caught her eye, this one lingering just beyond her line of sight. She had to look. Sahlin risked a quick glance in the direction of the new light. Everything, the sky above, the empty expanse to her left and her right, all of it remained black. But the light beneath her feet _was_ there, she was sure of it now, and it was more than just that single light; it was a path, a dull yellow glow emanating from beneath the ground itself, winding like a river through the blackness, stretching on for as far as she could see.

For a moment, Sahlin faltered, her feet hesitating where they stood upon the pale yellow light. It had to lead somewhere, somewhere _they _wanted—her judges or jailers or executioners, whoever this place belonged to, whoever _they_ were—it had to lead somewhere of their design, somewhere they intended her to go. The voice in her head screamed for her to run, to tear her eyes from the glowing path and forget it ever existed. But everything was starting to feel hazy again, and she could feel the bands tightening with her indecision. This was it. This was her chance. _Run, _the voice in her head begged, pleading, willing her feet to turn away: _run now!_ There was no one, nothing, for as far as she could see, and she was still certain there had to be another exit, some other way out. Reason told her she would find it, if she walked long enough, if she counted her steps and was careful not to lose herself in the blackness, she would find it. She could turn away from the path and find some way out of this madness, and then find a safe place to hole up and figure a way back to her own time.

_His eyes were green and his hair was an orangey-red color; there was a flask in his hand, stretched out to her._ The thought crept in, unbidden. _He watched her with unseeing eyes, not understanding, an unspoken question frozen forever on his face: "Why?"_

Sahlin ventured a step off the path, placing her feet on the black emptiness beside it. Nothing happened. _It was an accident_, she told herself. She had never meant to kill him, whoever he was. And this was never supposed to happen. She was an anachronism in this place, an aberration, a mistake. Whatever happened here, it was wrong. She needed to get home. They needed her there, needed the anchor on her hand. _He held out his arm, offering it to her, a flask of water, one small kindness in this dark and wrong place_.

The bands on her arms pulsed again. Every muscle ached to move, to be rid of the lighted path, to be rid of this place and this time. _His eyes were green and wide and uncomprehending and—_

"Fenedhis!" she cursed, and Sahlin knew, even before she forced herself to turn back, she knew her mind had already been made up. _His arm hung there, frozen, offering her his flask._ Her feet found the path again, a pale yellow road through the blackness, and she willed her feet to follow it. She owed him that much at least, the man with the outstretched hand. She owed it to him, as his murderer, to face her punishment, whatever it may be. And so she walked…on, and on, and on, and on…and on, for what felt like hours, she walked. She lost count of her steps. Time bent in on itself; it folded up and stretched out again. Sometimes the room felt tilted or blurry, like a trick of the Fade, other times it was so sharp she could almost see the little black dots that made up the wall of darkness that swallowed everything, sight and sound and direction. Beneath her, the path never veered or curved, it just stretched out into the nothingness ahead, never ending.

Again it occurred to her that it was possible this _was_ her punishment, that she'd had it all wrong, that there was never going to be a trial or an execution at the end of the path, that this was how they dealt with their criminals, these elves with their archaic language and talk of slavery: they locked them away in Nowhere. Again, Sahlin felt her feet falter, hesitating. The path beneath her pulsed, as if sensing her uncertainty. She was going nowhere. She was _in_ nowhere. There was nowhere to go. The darkness around her suddenly felt loud and close, like a shapeless black force pressing in on her, suffocating her. She felt the bands against her arms tighten and she took another step, trying to hold onto some shred of clarity, to _think_. She could turn back around, run for the doors, hurl herself against them and beg to be let out. _Sad Eyes would hear_. But which way were the doors? She had walked for so long, she had already lost count of her steps for a second time. The darkness was in her throat, making it hard to breathe.

_His eyes were green and his hand was stretched out to her, icicles hanging from the folds of his shirtsleeve. _She took another step forward, following the path, trying to think, to breathe…to atone.

But there was a glint in the corner of her eye, distracting her: a pale white beacon of light, shimmering in the distance, it seemed to merge with the path on the horizon, to glow brighter with each step she took. Sahlin could feel her feet moving beneath her with a will of their own, walking at first, then jogging, and finally running, racing toward the beacon at the end of the path. Her arms were pumping at her side as she sprinted; her lungs felt ready to burst. She had to reach it. She could feel the blood pulsing in her ears and the sweat rolling down her face, burning her eyes, blurring her vision. But it was getting closer, a bright, almost blinding white light. _Almost there…_

They appeared out of the blackness all at once: massive thrones of chairs, erupting into existence, blinding white stone seats, stretched out in a line. Right in front of her. Too close. _Too close, too close, too close._ Creators, she was going to smack right into them! Sahlin tried to stop, to dig her feet into the ground. She felt herself hurtling forward, careening toward the thrones. She wasn't going to stop in time. She braced herself for the collision—

And then it was over.

The darkness evaporated around her like water on hot coals, there one second and gone the next. She stood there, blinking stupidly against the blinding light. Her legs were no longer moving and her arms hung motionless at her side; she wasn't even sweating. The cavern was gone, replaced with a large open chamber, lined with pillars and flooded with light pouring in from windows all over. Sahlin spun around, wild eyed and confused, trying to make sense of what had happened, when her eyes found them. Two massive stone doors, twice as tall as the Eluvian and laced with intricate lyrium engravings. _The doors Whitey and Grumpy opened._ There was not a doubt in her mind they were one in the same. _But it wasn't possible._ The doors stood five, maybe six steps from where she herself stood. _Only five paces away, but she had been walking for— _

"Be easy, child."

Sahlin rounded on the sound, searching out its source, already certain of what—or, rather, _who_—she would find there. That voice had been at her side each time she had woken to consciousness in this wretched place, and the sound of it left the hairs at the back of her neck standing on end.

"Easy," the honey-haired elf repeated. Sahlin found her sitting straight-backed in one of the massive thrones she had been so certain only moments ago were right on top of her. Now they stood even further from her than the great doors to her back. Nothing in this place was as it seemed, Sahlin noted to herself. Though, if she chose to trust her eyes now, there were two massive white thrones standing upon a dais in the center of the airy chamber and five others standing just in front of the platform, stretching from one massive marbled pillar to another. The honey-haired elf occupied one of the two largest thrones, and beside her sat a black-haired elf with a foreboding brow and even harder black eyes.

"You have passed the Trial, child," Honey Hair continued, and Sahlin chose to take that as a good sign.

So far, she had no reason to distrust the she-elf seated upon her great throne; she had spoken fairly to her in their few exchanges, and had been one of the few willing to listen to Sahlin's theory that she had been displaced in time. But that did not make the coldness in her icy blue eyes seem any warmer, nor did it soften the hard tone that spoke such kind words. _Besides_, Sahlin reminded herself, _nothing in this place is as it seems._

"Thank you," she managed at last. The words felt awkward and wrong in her mouth, but they were obviously expecting her to say _something_.

"Ma serannas?" the hard faced elf roared. And all too suddenly Sahlin was sure that had not been the _something_ she was expected to say. "Ma'hahlas na Elgalana, din'rivas!"

Sahlin was still struggling to make sense of his words when the honey-haired elf to his right issued a flurry of her own, to which Hard Face merely grunted.

"Then control your creature, vhenan," he growled. "Or she will not live long enough to tell her tale." The hard-faced elf waved a hand, granting leave to his mate to handle things. It was all Sahlin could do to suppress the shiver of cold that shot down her spine; she very much wanted to live long enough to answer their questions—and preferably long after that as well. But thus far, their sense of protocol and decorum would have left even Josephine's head spinning.

To the right of Hard Face, the honey-haired woman inclined her head graciously before setting her cold eyes upon Sahlin. "You _will_ show respect, child. Kneel before your Makers."

Sahlin felt the color rising to her cheeks as Josephine's Antivan voice ricocheted between her ears: "_It is customary for the accused to kneel before you as they await your judgment, Inquisitor. It is a show of respect."_ Apparenly, Josephine actually could have navigated even this precarious situation with poise. For perhaps the hundredth time in the past few months, Sahlin felt utterly ill-equipped for the path that Fate had decided for her.

"Ir abelas, haren," she whispered. Sahlin let her knees fall softly to the stone floor and hoped her use of their language might be taken as a gesture of good faith.

"Hahren?" Hard Face bellowed yet again. _So much for good faith_. "You dare call your Maker 'hahren'?"

"Ir-I-apologize," Sahlin stammered, searching for some way to start over. "I meant no disrespect. It's a term of respect, in my time. Your language and laws are still very foreign to me; we don't have Makers, exactly. I mean to say, I didn't know. I mean, I meant no disrespect." Sahlin clenched her jaw, willing herself to just stop talking altogether. She was babbling at best, damning herself further at worst.

There was a moment of silence during which Sahlin felt reasonably certain Hard Face's glower might burn a hole through her skull before this hearing was finished, and her shoulders sagged in relief when another voice spoke up from somewhere off to the side, finally drawing his hard glare with it.

"Do you not honor your People's gods, child?" the she-elf asked. Sahlin found her easily enough, sitting upon one of the lower thrones; it was the elf who had healed her wounds after her fall down the mountainside. She shared the same honey-colored hair as the other, but her eyes were a warm, inviting green and the voice that accompanied her words radiated a warmth that matched their kindness.

Sahlin weighed her answers quickly, and decided on the truest possible one she could offer. "The Creators no longer hear our prayers. As such, we've lost much of our culture from the past." The words felt oddly incomplete, without some issuance of a proper title, but 'hahren' had left Hard Face so disgruntled she thought it best to abandon honorifics altogether.

For their part, the elves scattered before her seemed not to notice her lack of decorum. A frenzied whirl of conversation swept over them the moment she mentioned their absent Creators, but it was a cacophony of broken or entirely foreign elvish that left Sahlin's head spinning. Rather than exhaust herself on trying to follow any of their flurried speech, she chose to set about inspecting her remaining judges—or _Makers_, or whatever it was they chose to call themselves. It was then that she noticed for perhaps the first time they were unmarked elves all, every one of them as barefaced as a Marcher flat-ear. Yet again, that detail seemed immensely important, but she willed herself to tuck the thought away for later scrutiny. For now, her eyes flitted quickly from one elf to the next, trying to take them all in before her attention was recalled by the now apparently bickering group.

At the far right side of the chamber, a black-haired she-elf with equally black eyes stood just in front of the furthest pillar, a dead animal at her feet and blood smeared against her breeches. She was at that moment protesting against something one of the elves further down the line had said and, judging from the ear-splitting pitch of her voice, Sahlin was sure she had been the dark wisp from before. To her side was a halla-eyed she-elf with pale hair and an absent expression who seemed to be as much a clueless spectator to the conversation taking place around her as Sahlin herself was.

Sahlin's eyes continued to move down the line, taking in the healer and another dark-haired elf of no particular note when her gaze landed on _him_. There was no mistaking the inky black hair that spilled over his rigid shoulders or the way his lips curled into a sneer as he bantered with the others. Sahlin could still feel the roughness of his cold hands upon her skin as he fastened the bands around her arms, and the way his fingers had drifted up and over her shoulder, cupping her neck; she could still feel the heat of his breath against her ear as he told her there would be time enough for him to teach her to behave properly, later. Her blood ran cold at the sight of him and Sahlin eyes hastened to find the last of the elves, to rid her sight entirely of his dark image.

But the figure she found sitting at the end of the long row of thrones was no more a welcome sight than the one who had preceded him. Sitting there, lounging carelessly across the last of the thrones, red-brown hair splayed over his shoulders, was the face she knew belonged to him, to Solas; and yet it was also the face she knew could not be his. Sahlin found herself so lost in his likeness that she almost failed to notice the broad-shouldered elf propped against the armrest of the same throne, that is, until his deep voice thundered out across the great chamber, demanding her attention.

"Can you understand me?"

Sahlin finally tore her gaze from Not-Solas long enough to take in the elf perched at his side. "Do you understand what I am saying?" he repeated, this time more slowly.

Sahlin gave a quick nod, trying to glean what she might have missed from their expressions. "Yes, yes, I'm sorry."

"Good." Big Shoulders flashed a toothy grin that seemed almost disturbingly out of place among their present company, and continued. "I asked if the Creators, as you call them, are no longer with your People, why did you walk the Path at all?"

_Why did she walk the path?_ Sahlin stared at him. _Because it was a_ path_ in the _dark. And yet something tugged at her thoughts, reminding her that was not entirely true. Everything in her had wanted to run, to flee the path and never look back. The bands on her arm pulsed again, and she knew she had been in one place for too long. Already it was getting harder to think.

"Answer the question, child." It was Honey Hair, curtly intervening on her behalf yet again.

"I owed it to him," Sahlin panted; each pulse of the bands left her breathless and scrambling to piece together the simplest words. The pain returned so quickly and with such a vengeance, it left her head spinning. "To the man I killed. It was an accident; I didn't mean to. But I owed it to him—"

A high peal of laughter drowned out the last of her words, but even that sounded far away against the deafening sound of blood pounding against her ears. Sahlin squinted toward the sound, where the blood-stained elf stood lounging against the far pillar, but her vision was already going black. _Not again._

**o – o – o – o - o**

"She felt _guilty_," Andruil squealed, mid-laugh. "The slave felt _sorry_ for killing another slave, and so she walked the Gauntlet of Faith! For what? Penance? Like I said, the girl is mad."

"Penance can be as powerful a sentiment as reverence, sister," Sylaise argued. Of course, it was always difficult to decide whether the healer truly believed the words she spoke, or if she argued simply for the sake of arguing. Even at times such as this, Sylaise had never been one to miss an opportunity to counter a point.

Fen'Harel regarded his sisters, still half-lost in a sea of his own thoughts. Once again, they had abandoned the language of the shemlen and slipped back into their own, more nuanced speech. To be sure, it _was _unprecedented, walking the Gauntlet for any reason other than to meet one's Makers. And yet, in all his long years upon this earth, he had never before encountered a mortal capable of entering the Fade, let alone a creature able to travel across time. Even Elgar'nan and Mythal lacked that ability.

"We're going to lose her." The craftsman's voice at his ear brought him back once more to the present.

"Hm?" Fen'Harel followed June's gaze to where it lingered on the slave, kneeling almost doubled-over on the floor before them. He was right. The girl looked ready to drop at any second.

"Falon'Din's work, no doubt," the craftsman muttered. Fen'Harel only nodded. The God of the Dead had never gone easy on his slaves, but to band one so tightly was impermissible, even among the pantheon.

But Sylaise and Andruil were still locked in their debate, and the dread twins, it seemed, had joined them as well. Ghilan'nain watched on idly while the All-Mother and All-Father sat heads-together in a hushed discussion of their own. Only June seemed not to have forgotten the slave that had brought them all together.

Fen'Harel, for his part, was content to let the bands have her. They would not kill her, not yet, and even if she were to lose consciousness, it had already been decided that they could not risk questioning her any further. Not without a better plan. Dirthamen had been quick to point out the risks of learning too much of their own futures. If it was in fact true that the slave somehow traveled to them from a moment yet to pass, the greatest threat she posed to them was that of the knowledge none of them should ever possess.

The Dread Wolf turned to where June had been sitting at his back, only to find the armrest empty and the craftsman striding across the chamber toward the slave. And he was not the only one to notice.

"What are you doing?" Andruil cried out, abandoning her argument altogether. Almost at once, the rest of the eyes in the room followed, watching June.

"A kindness," the craftsman barked, face-forward and set on his mission.

"Have you forgotten so quickly, brother? That slave has already killed one man." Falon'Din was on his feet, shouting across the chamber.

Fen'Harel risked a sidewise glance toward the All-Father; it was never a certainty, Elgar'nan's intervention in the quibbles of his children, and at that moment he looked more than content to let this scene play out without his involvement.

Neither did June seem overly concerned with the God of the Dead. The massive craftsman dropped to a knee just beside the slave. "As our sister pointed out only moments ago, the death of a slave is hardly worth such a penance. Did I hear incorrectly, brother, or didn't you agree?" June kept his eyes set on the first band as he spoke. He must have found the latch that held the cuff in place because in a matter of seconds, it had been unclasped and discarded on the floor.

The slave slumped forward as the weight of it was released from her arm, but June slipped a steadying had around her midsection, already moving to unclasp the second binding.

"And what of the mark on her hand?" Falon'Din roared, though for all his outrage, he remained standing just in front of his throne. There were not many among the pantheon willing to risk the craftsman's heavy wrath.

"Surely," June teased as he unfastened the second band, "the great God of the Dead does not fear a mark of the Fade?" The sound of the last band clinking against the stone floor ricocheted from one wall to another as the slave fell limply against the craftsman's arm.

"Enough," the All-Mother called. She too was on her feet, and moving to rest a steadying hand against Falon-Din's shoulder. "It is done. And it has been decided."

That seemed to pique their attention, as every gaze turned away from the scene unfolding at the center of the chamber to watch Mythal.

"Fen'Harel will take custody of the slave," Mythal turned her blue-eyed gaze upon him, and it was all the Dread Wolf could do to bow his head. He hardly needed another slave; he sometimes felt his halls were far too crowded with them already, but he never missed an opportunity to explore a new curiosity of the Fade.

The All-Mother had already raised her hand to silence Falon'Din's protests, letting them all know her decision was final. "Fen'Harel is the only one among us capable of Dream-Walking. He will learn what he can from the slave and discern what is safe to be shared among us. When your investigation is complete," Mythal returned her attention to Fen'Harel directly, "you will sever your own connection to these memories in the Fade. All of them. We will remind you of what you need to know after. Is this understood?" Again, the Dread Wolf merely dipped his head in acquiescence.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Sahlin groaned, not bothering to open her eyes just yet. It was beginning to take its toll, constantly slipping in and out of consciousness. She was strongly considering letting the black take her once more, for just a while longer, when the heat of an arm pressing against her stomach startled her to alertness.

"Whoa, easy there," the husky voice sounded as startled as she was, but that didn't stop Sahlin from clawing at the arm around her middle, trying to pry herself free from it. "No one's going to hurt you," the voice rumbled again, thick and loud in her ear.

For a moment she stilled, half-convinced it was the Iron Bull whose massive arm was wrapped around her. But then her eyes fell on them, the bare-faced elves staring at her from their massive seats, and she threw all her weight into a lunge to the side, where his fingers held her in place. Her captor must have been surprised because she fell out of his grasp, landing on the floor with a hard _thud_, and scrambled away from him as quickly as she could manage.

"Enough!" Honey Hair bellowed, drawing Sahlin's attention. "You have much to learn, child, not the least of which is a sense of deference for your gods. Now stand up, you look ridiculous."

Sahlin gaped at her. _Gods?_ Had she finally hit her head one too many times?

"Hurry up now, we haven't got all day. On your feet," the she-elf barked, and out of sheer shock Sahlin moved to obey. "That's better. Your fate has been decided, and it is far kinder than you likely deserve, so be grateful. I am releasing you from my service, into that of Fen'Harel's."

_This must be what going mad feels like_. Sahlin stared at the she-elf's perfectly serious expression, waiting for the laugh, for the punch line of some sick joke, for Sera or Dorian to come leaping from behind a pillar cackling over the world's worst prank. But Not-Solas was standing up from his alabaster throne and straightening his long, grey robes. As he moved toward her, Sahlin could feel herself shaking her head, backing away.

_Fen-Harel?_ He was a myth, a story the elders made up to blame for the absence of the Creators, of the gods. _Of the gods. The Creators. The Makers._ A pit the size of dragon age dropped in her stomach. _No, no_. It couldn't be. It wasn't. Her gaze flew from one barefaced elf to the next. They each watched her in stony silence.

"Come." It was his voice, Solas's. But the expression was all wrong. She stared at him, not comprehending though he spoke the Common Tongue. "We're leaving." It was _his_ voice, she was sure of it. But his back was already to her, and he was walking toward the mammoth lyrium-engraved doors. "Now, din'rivas!"

Sahlin hazarded one last glance at the elves still arranged before her. The black-haired elf who had locked the bands around her arms stared back, his lips twisting into a sickening curl, and once again her blood ran cold at the memory of his promise. She looked back at Not-Solas, standing at the door, tracing its engravings just as Whitey and Grumpy had. Beside her, the broad shouldered elf nodded, encouraging her to follow his kin. And somehow, despite their earlier scuffle, there was something in his look she trusted. Besides, she reasoned, anything was better than staying behind with the rest.

Sahlin inhaled a deep breath, and then made to follow the auburn-haired image of Solas.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Mythal watched as the slave made her way toward the lyrium gates. At that moment, a thought took hold in her mind, a possibility she had only barely considered, a potential eventuality still too remote to call it certain.

"And Fen'Harel," she called across the chamber. The Dread Wolf cocked his head, just barely. "Do replace her vallaslin; no slave of mine is so unruly."

Neither the wolf nor the slave responded, though she was certain both had heard her command.

Moments later they disappeared beyond the lyrium gate. _Was it chance or fate?_ She could never decide.

* * *

**A/N:** Thanks for bearing with me through that scene. Rest assured, the weirdness that went down in the "Gauntlet" is significant. I didn't put you (or myself- that was godawful to write) through that for nothing!

Next scene: LAVELLAN AND FEN'HAREL. For Real. More dialogue than description. It's happening. I know, I'm giddy too!

**Also, it may not seem that way, but your reviews help to keep me on track. If I start to wander, getting little pings for reviews keeps me motivated! So THANKS to all who have reviewed and continued to review! **


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: **Finally rolling along on this story. Now that we're actually getting into some dialogue and I'm not performing the let's-introduce-the-entire-panetheon-at-once balancing act, things should move much more quickly. I should get one, maybe two more chapters up this week.

_Note_: "Adris" is an OC from my A World Shaken piece. Long story short, he's the First of Clan Lavellan (Sahlin's actually the Second; AWS clears that ordeal up) and he and Sahlin had a thing. Not super significant to this story line. But as I stated earlier, this piece will eventually tuck in-between two chapters of that storyline, so there may be the occasional crossover.

_"Garen"_: Essentially, elven for 'master.' Figured I needed something, so this is a made-up hodgepodge of elgar (spirit) and haren (elder). Just roll with it. Or correct me if there really is a better fit!

_Keeper_: Will clear this up in future chapters; suffice it to say, he's the head of the temple's slaves, their keeper. The Dalish apparently got everything else wrong, so why not, right?

* * *

**Chapter Five**

Sahlin stopped not far behind him, the elf with Solas's face and the Dread Wolf's name. He had not so much as looked back once during their walk from the lyrium-wrought gates to where they stood now, just before the base of the Eluvian. Sahlin wondered at the mirrored device, at the incredible insignificance of it. Only hours earlier, she had practically dug her heels into the stone as Grumpy forced her from it, desperate for one last glimpse of the Seeing Glass. But now…now everything was changed. If the honey-haired elf was to be trusted, she was standing at the heels of Fen'Harel, a god. What was the sight of an Eluvian compared to that of a god? The god. The worst of the Creators, who had bested even Falon'Din and Elgar'nan by locking them away in the Fade. And she had left with him, willingly, without so much as a word of resistance. Adris would shit a nug. The Creators were _real_, not figments of the elders' imaginations. How many times had she railed against Keeper Deshanna for her misguided belief in their tales? How many times had she refused to believe the stories?

"Come." Sahlin stared at him, at Fen'Harel speaking in Solas's voice, still not sure she believed any of it. "We have lingered here too long already."

She followed his gesture and stepped forward, conscious of complying with his instructions for a second time. The memory of his hand closing around her arm, of the pain that seared through her as he wrenched it back during their first encounter was still fresh on her mind. But what other option did she have? At her side, the supposed Fen'Harel touched a hand to the glass-like pool in the Eluvian. Waves rippled out from his fingertips as their mirrored reflections receded into the carved frame, replaced with an image of high earthen walls encasing what looked to be a red-cobbled hall. Sahlin watched as the magic took form and steeled herself for the sensation she knew would follow, for the breathless plunge across its surface. She felt Fen'Harel's hand at her back, and for the briefest second she was back in the Fade at Haven. Solas's hands were entwined around her waist, holding her against him. But just like images in the Eluvian, the memory was already receding, giving way to the cobbled hall and earthen walls. Sahlin took a deep breath and held it as she crossed the threshold.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Fen'Harel exhaled a breath he was embarrassed to admit he'd been holding. But the warmth of the stone beneath his bare toes had reminded him that he was home at last, beyond the watchful glares of Elgar'nan and Falon'Din, and beyond the reach of Dirthamen's discerning gifts. It had been decades since a gathering of the entire pantheon and he had forgotten how trying the company of his kin had become. It had not always been that way. There were feuds, of course, but they had been minor and ever-changing. For the first time in their long history, lines were being drawn, and alliances were emerging. To what end, he could not have predicted. But their delineations were apparent, and it left him feeling like a sylvan, digging deep into the earth to take root before a storm. He only hoped his roots were deep enough.

"You're back. Good, good." Fen'Harel looked up just in time to see the rickety keeper rounding an earthen corner. "There have been some—some…" the elf trailed off, his gaze fixed on the figure Fen'Harel was certain still stood at his heel. "You know, it can wait. Now what on Mythal's great earth is _that_?"

Fen'Harel followed his keeper's gaze, really looking at the slave for the first time since their first unsettling encounter. She was small for an elvhen, closer to the size of an adolescent than an adult, though he was certain she was grown. "_That_," he intoned, "is a slave whose insubordination may rival even your own, Tameran."

"Oh? Did the Mother command her to tidy her braid? Did she chop it off instead? Honestly, garen, I've seen newborn babes with more hair on their head. And is that the Mother's mark? Something about it looks—"

"She is an anomaly," Fen'Harel cut in. He liked the keeper, he always had. But the man had a way of going on that made him long for the brevity of a mortal life. "In many ways."

He was still eyeing the girl, himself, trying to decide what to make of her and her incredulous story. Her hair _was_ short, but not nearly as short as Tameran made it out to be. Unkempt, straw-color locks jutted out at every angle, just barely brushing her neck. It was an interesting look, to be sure, and one that he had never seen. But that hardly meant she was from another _time_. The girl shifted in front of him, chewing on her lip childishly. No doubt she was trying to decide what to make of him as well. Few enough slaves ever actually encountered their Makers, to be on trial for her life one minute and entrusted into the service of a god then next was certainly enough to make any slave's head spin.

"Prepare a bed for her," he told the keeper at last, almost as an afterthought. "She'll be staying a while."

"Not permanently, garen?"

"No, not permanently." However this ended, Fen'Harel thoroughly doubted it was with the slave still alive. "That's enough questions for now, Tameran. Leave us, and have dinner sent to my chambers."

The keeper ducked his head in a bow that sent his white braid swaying like a pendulum from over his shoulder.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Sahlin watched the white-haired elf disappear around the corner. Her head was still swimming from the effort of trying to follow their speech. In the end, she'd picked up only a handful of words before something else, the elf's vallaslin, occupied her thoughts entirely.

At first she had thought the white-haired elf wore the mark of Dirthamen. Its lines were similar enough. But the nearer he came, and the longer he remained, the more Sahlin realized that the writing on his face was like nothing she had ever seen. She had grown up amid a sea of vallaslins her entire life: Elgar'nan, Mythal, June, Sylaise, Dirthamen and Falon'Din, Andruil and Ghilan'nain. She knew them all by heart. But the tattoo that wound itself down the elf's face was entirely unknown to her.

There was only one god among the Creators whose mark the Dalish refused to wear, and it was a mark that had been long since forgotten in their history, a testament to how profoundly the People loathed and feared Him in equal measure. No Dalish had ever worn the blood writing of Fen'Harel. That one, simple detail, more than anything else impressed the weight of its realization upon her, demanding she reconcile herself with the truth it pronounced: The Creators were real. And _he_ was one of them, a Creator and their Destroyer.

After a moment, Sahlin realized she had been staring blankly at a bulbous patch of clay in the wall, chewing the inside of her lip to a bloodly pulp. It was all true. Every bit of it. Every story. The words were repeating again and again on a loop in her mind, like the low beating of a drum, drowning out everything else. When she finally managed to tear her attention from the clump of clay, her eyes met his for just a moment. That was all it had taken to send her heart leaping into her throat. She knew that look, the one he eyed her with now. She had seen it a hundred times before, back in Haven, on the road to Skyhold, in the rotunda, sitting around a fire in the Hinterlands. It was the same narrow-eyed smirk Solas wore when he considered something new or perplexing.

"So…you're Fen'Harel?" She spoke up in an attempt to dislodge the painful lump from her throat, to break the uncomfortable silence lingering between them, to shake that damn expression from his face, but most of all to convince herself, to finally wrap her mind around the reality of where—and when—she was.

"I am," he replied good-naturedly. To her chagrin, the lopsided smile still remained fixed across his lips. "And you are a slave, or have you forgotten how to address your garen?"

_Garen?_ She'd cross that bridge later. Best to deal with the more pressing matters first. "I'm not a slave," she said, annunciating each word carefully and with what she hoped was some conviction. She'd said those words so often lately she was beginning to doubt whether they were true herself.

"Oh but you are. Your face marks you as such, and even if it did not, your actions yesterday would have decided your position for you." Sahlin opened her mouth to protest, but Fen'Harel cut in before she had the chance. "Perhaps it is true. Perhaps you are lost in time, as you claim. But you are in this time now, _my _time, and your face as well as your actions have decided your station. The sooner you accept that reality, the easier things will go for you. Now, I am not the habit of lingering in my own halls. If you are quite finished, follow me."

Fen'Harel turned without a second look, and though she was most certainly _not _finished, Sahlin was forced to follow or be left behind.

"You live here?" she panted the words as she hastened to keep up with his long-legged pace. The bands on her arms may have been removed—a fact she gratefully noticed in the stone corridor just outside the Eluvian, though she could not have said _how_ that happened—but she was still fatigued from their leeching.

"You find that odd?" Everything about him was so _Solas_. It was uncanny.

"It's made of dirt," she breathed. "You're supposed to be a god, right?" Even as a child, she had never really been the most deferent of Dalish, and something about spending the past ten years of her life asserting the gods were imaginary figures made it difficult for her to cultivate what would probably have been an appropriate sense of awe in his presence. Besides, if she could just figure a way back to Skyhold, it would be as if none of this had ever happened anyway.

Sahlin stopped. The realization hit her like a brick wall. This wasn't the future; this wasn't some potential version of Redcliffe; this was the past.

"This has happened before." The words slipped past her lips, but she barely noticed. Her thoughts were still reeling with the implications of what it meant to have traveled _back_ in time. There was no going 'back,' no preventing any of this from ever happening. This wasn't an if, or a possibility. It was real. It was all real.

"What did you say?" Fen'Harel had turned, a few paces ahead of her down the hall. The smirk was gone, replaced with a discerning wrinkle across his broad forehead.

Sahlin shook her head. "This wasn't supposed to happen. I shouldn't be here. The future…it can be undone, prevented. But this can't. Even once I go home, I will have been here, now. This has already happened, who knows how many centuries ago. And I _wasn't_ here. I shouldn't be here now." The words fell off her tongue as they reached it. She heard them with Fen'Harel for the first time, working through each thought as she spoke. This was all wrong. Redcliffe had been bad enough. But this?

**o – o – o – o - o**

Fen'Harel eyed her, considering each word, weighing it for sincerity. If this was all a ruse of some sort, it was a good one, and under normal circumstances, he might even have been impressed. But these were far from normal circumstances and everything about the girl seemed to indicate she was telling the truth.

"Perhaps," he remarked, "you should have considered that before tearing a hole through time."

Fen'Harel did not bother to see what reaction his words had elicited. He turned once more and made his way toward the end of the corridor. His chamber was not far off, and he would think more clearly once he could do so in comfort, away from the potentially prying eyes and listening ears of his temple's many slaves and servants. He trusted the slave would follow, and after a few moments the sound of her bare footfalls against the stone assured him that he had been right. For all her posturing, a slave instinctively chooses to follow. It was simply their way. But his mind had already abandoned the short-haired, shem-tongued figure behind him; his thoughts were fixed on the possibilities of temporal manipulation, on functions of the Fade he had never before considered. Dirthamen had not been wrong to express concern, and the slave's paradox was a worthwhile caution to consider. And yet, to walk a path that had not yet been hardened into history, that still had the potential to evolve or collapse…it was a wild thought, one he was sure would leave his mind aching for days at the sheer possibility of it all.

He felt the familiar nob against the palm of his hand before he even realized they had arrived at his chambers. Fen'Harel quelled the whirlwind of thoughts brewing in his mind, and pushed open the large oak door. It creaked as it swung on its hinges, something that would surely need to be fixed. Had it always done that? He could hardly remember, so alight were his thoughts with this new possibility of the Fade.

He stepped just inside the room and the slave followed close behind. Mana tingled across the hairs on his arm as it flowed outward from his fingertips, stoking the cold logs on the hearth to life. Fen'Harel made his way to the fireplace, motioning for the slave to follow. He dropped himself unceremoniously into the closest seat, a plush armchair positioned just in front of the low flames. In front of him, the slave settled into the armchair directly opposite him. He frowned, aware of how inappropriate that assumption had been, that she should sit in his presence without being offered a seat. But at that moment, he hardly cared. His thoughts were still on the Fade.

The slave shifted in front of him, fidgeting in the large seat. He narrowed his eyes, trying to decide how best to direct his line of questioning. There was so much to know; he could hardly still his thoughts long enough to settle on any one question.

"You want to know how I did it, how I traveled back in time," she said, watching him. Fen'Harel raised his gaze to meet hers. Her dark eyes, the color of sylvan's leaves after a storm, met his own evenly. He had to admit, that would be the best place to begin. And yet her presumption to speak out of turn yet again left him bristling. Everything about the marked creature sitting across from him shouted defiance, from the tilt of her chin, to the surety in her eyes. Fen'Harel barely managed to bite back a reprimand. There would be time enough for that later.

Instead, the Dread Wolf reclined deeper into the cushions of his seat, and waved his hand, granting her leave to speak. "That _is_ the reason you are here, din'rivas," he stressed the word, "so if you have a story to tell, I suggest you begin now."

* * *

**A/N: **At some point, I'll probably do a check-in to verify whether or not people are actually reading/enjoying this storyline. I have AWS on hold at the moment, so I'll need to determine if I should just lay this to rest to focus on that for a while.

I'll give it some time to build up the characters and plot line a bit more, but if you are reading and you know you'd like to see this continue, just give me a 'nod.'

And, Asilyessam, I think I've just gone too long without playing, because I'm definitely beginning to think of this more and more in terms of game-play! Hopefully that will make for some fun storytelling!


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Sahlin hesitated, considering her options_._ _Weighing her hand_, Varric would say. At the moment, she held all the cards._ Aside from my freedom_, she thought bitterly, but Sahlin pushed the thought aside and forced herself to focus on what she did have: on the information _he_ wanted. Across from her, Fen'harel eyed her expectantly, waiting, breathing new meaning to the phrase "by the Dread Wolf."

_The Dread Wolf. Fen'harel_. The name stuck in her throat like debris in a flue, making it difficult to breathe, to think. It didn't help that the Wolf still wore Solas's face, a slightly younger version of it perhaps, but his nonetheless. Up close she had expected the likeness to wane, but it had only grown more apparent. There were subtle differences, of course. Fen'harel's eyes were brighter and more alert, his complexion seemed smoother somehow, and his hair…well, he had it. Vibrant red-brown waves fell in a cascade of partially plaited knots well past his shoulders, a far cry from Solas's clean-shaven temple. And yet, through it all, she knew it to be him. Solas.

Her head reeled with the implications. Solas was Fen'harel. Or Fen'harel was Solas? She wasn't certain the distinction made a difference but still…it was something.

"Well?"

Sahlin jumped at the sound of his voice. From the folds of his deep chair, the Dread Wolf watched her, strumming his fingers expectantly, waiting.

Sahlin took a deep breath, steeling herself for the conversation she knew was imminent. She'd always been good at lying, but lying to the _God _of the Tricksters? Was she _that_ good? She doubted it. Of course, partial truths were simpler than lies, and she had no intention of deceiving him outright. As much as she loathed to admit it, she would need his help to return to Skyhold, and that meant there were things he would need to know, truths she would have to tell. But it was still too soon to know how thoroughly she could trust the barefaced elf. Better to wait, to gauge his character. In the meantime, though, she would have to give him something.

"I didn't _choose_ to travel back in time, or forward, for that matter," she said at last. She spoke carefully, intentionally. If Leliana had taught her anything, it was that knowledge held power and, fortunately for Sahlin, that was one weapon she still had at her disposal. Information. She simply needed to be careful not to give away too much of it too quickly.

Across from her the Dread Wolf arced a brow, wanting for more.

"I was attacked by a magister," she continued, "Gereon Alexius. He—"

"A magister?" Fen'harel's bare face tightened, and not for the first time, Sahlin wondered just how far back Alexius had flung her. She hadn't expected the title to mean anything to him, but it was clear from the Wolf's face that he knew the word. More pieces of the broken puzzle.

Sahlin gave him a curt nod and added, "From Tevinter." She had hoped to glean some concept of the date from his reaction, but the tightness had already gone from Fen'harel's jaw, replaced with a complacent mask, Solas's mask.

"Why did he attack you?"

Obviously, Sahlin thought, he didn't know everything there was to know of Tevinter—ancient or otherwise—if he had to ask why a magister attacked an elf. In response, she merely shrugged. "He was our prisoner."

"Your master's prisoner?"

Sahlin felt her jaw clench. "No." It was an effort, but she managed to keep her voice even. "I don't have a master. As I said, I'm _not_ a slave."

"Oh?" It was the same 'oh' Solas used in response to Vivienne when they debated the finer points of the Chantry's laws on magic. "Then who is this 'we?'" Fen'harel countered. "You said the magister was 'our' prisoner…"

"My companions and I. We captured Alexius after—" Sahlin caught herself. If she explained how Alexius had sent them to the future, she would also be forced to explain how they were able to return, and that was one card she wasn't ready to play just yet. "After he attacked our friends," she finished. It wasn't a lie, at least.

"That seems to be a great deal of effort, tearing a hole in time itself to be rid of one's captors. You and your companions must make for quite the adversaries."

Sahlin bristled at the insinuation. _Try me_, she thought, _I've already fought off one would-be god._ Aloud she settled for a tense, "Quite."

The Wolf's eyes narrowed. "Tell me then, is temporal manipulation common in your time?" Something about the way he spoke was different, more menacing than before. A low threat.

For the first time, Sahlin recognized nothing of Solas in the barefaced elf in front of her. He was entirely Fen'harel, the God of Deceit, the Bringer of Nightmares, and it was all she could do to shake her head "no."

"So am I to assume, then, that you have no idea how the magister managed to accomplish such a feat?"

Again, Sahlin shook her head. In truth, she knew more than even she might have guessed. For weeks after their return from Redcliffe, Solas had questioned Dorian on the process incessantly, and she could still remember a surprising amount of what the Tevinter mage had said. Of course, none of it mattered without the amulet, but she was not willing to part with that much information either, not yet.

"And your mark," Fen'harel continued, "it pulses with the magic of the Fade. I suppose you do not understand it either?"

Sahlin wavered. He didn't believe her. But she had already said too much under the guise of ignorance to back down now. "_Never back out of a bluff, Snowflake," _Varric's voice rang between her ears. _"If the bastard's onto you, make him work for it."_ At the time, they had been playing a game of Wicked Grace and the bastard in question was the Iron Bull but—current company considered—she thought the term fit well enough.

"It's just a mark," she answered stupidly, "a cut that never healed, really. I was fighting a rage demon when—"

"Enough."

The tone of his voice sent chills rippling across her skin, but she stood her ground, "—when I felt a surge—"

"I said enough!"

The Dread Wolf was on his feet, glaring. Sahlin scrambled out of her chair, reaching mechanically for the staff normally slung across her back. But that, like so much, had been left back at Skyhold, where it wouldn't begin to exist for another thousand years.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Fen'harel inhaled a steadying breath. He could hardly recall the last time such a rush of emotion had overtaken him. The reaction was base, more befitting of her station than his, and yet a part of him was wont to return to his usual, casual state of indifference. Though he might never have admitted it, he enjoyed the thrill of fury her obstinacy had stirred in him; it had been so long since he had felt such untempered passion. Felt anything, really.

The slave was apparently lying, though he was not yet certain to what extent. Even now she stood before him, poised to retaliate. It was more defiance than he would stand to tolerate, lax though he was with his slaves. There were traditions to observe, asinine customs that kept their quickening culture intact. And the slave before him posed a greater threat to that balance than most. _One of Mother's slaves fell out of the Fade_. A slave, a lesser. Sent physically through the Fade. Through time. It was the kind of tale revolutions were made of, and the pantheon was already wavering, precariously straddling the tenuous line between peace and war.

Fen'harel closed the small distance between them in a few steps. The slave, at least, had the sense to back herself against the legs of the armchair. Though he was sure the girl recoiled in fear, her dark eyes glared back at him, challenging his advance. Even Tameran would have never dared such an open show of rebellion, and the sight of it—of her—stoked to life a fire in him that had been dormant for centuries.

Fen'harel reached for her marked hand, and staggered. A raw wave of mana struck him squarely in the chest, the first physical assault he had felt in decades. The slave took advantage of his shock and slipped around the chair, into the center of the room. Her green eyes darted wildly from one corner of the chamber to the next, no doubt looking for something to augment her attack.

Though it only took him a moment to recover from her misguided assault, Fen'harel lingered near the hearth, observing her desperate efforts from beneath a knitted brow. He finally understood her brashness, her defiance, her smaller stature. She was not elvhen. Her magic betrayed her. She had given away far more in her hasty attack than she could have anticipated. Someone less attuned to the machinations of the Fade might have misinterpreted the potency of her assault, but he knew better. The majority of her power was drawn from the Fade, through the slit of an anchor in her hand; she weaved its will as though it were her own, and a part of him was impressed its virulence had not killed her already. But the other part of him recognized what such a revelation would mean to the pantheon, how profoundly her existence would threaten their weakening claims. She was not just a slave, but a _mortal_ who had been sent physically through the Fade, who controlled its essence as if she were one of the gods themselves.

He wanted a moment to consider the implications, but he could already feel the mana welling in her from across the room, readying for another attack. Fen'harel raised a hand and used his own intrinsic connection to the Fade to disrupt hers. He abandoned his perch by the hearth and moved to close the gap between them, maintaining his siphon on her magic with every step. The slave's eyes grew wide as she realized her impotency against him, and she moved to flee. But Fen'harel was not Andruil; the concept of a chase was hardly amusing to him. He curled the fingers on his outstretched hand to a close and in front of him, the slave staggered, paralyzed from the neck down.

She shook her head furiously as he neared, glaring daggers from her glassy green eyes. "I am _not_ a slave," she growled through clenched teeth. "I answered your questions. I—"

"You _lied_ to me," Fen'harel cut in. Even at his most charitable, he had never appreciated the mindlessness of a poorly constructed deceit. Behind him, the door to his chamber creaked open. Tamaren with dinner, no doubt. He had intended to inspect the anchor before the night passed, but there would be time enough for that later. Let her consider this first encounter of theirs. It would not be the last.

Fen'harel ignored the keeper at his back and raised his hands to the slave's face, pressing against her temples with each fingertip. Panic rose in her eyes, and he could feel her desperate attempts to wrest free from his hold, but his stasis field held her securely in place.

"You will not lie to me again," he warned.

**o – o – o – o - o**

Sahlin didn't think it was possible to hate anything more than she hated Corypheus, but in that moment, she hated the Dread Wolf more, for his arrogance, for his cruelty, for how profoundly he had contorted the image of Solas. She looked away, biting back tears as his palms pressed forcibly against her cheeks; she didn't want to connect Solas's face to that brutality.

"You will not lie to me again," he said.

But he didn't know her very well. "You can't make me—"

Sahlin screamed as a hot knife drew itself across her forehead. Her vision went yellow and it was hard to hear. She could still feel his hands pressing against her temples. _Where was the knife?_ Pain like she had never felt bore into her skull. Somewhere far away she could hear her own earsplitting screams.

And then the world went black.

**o – o – o – o - o**

The slave's face dropped lifelessly to her chest, still suspended upright by his stasis hex. Mythal's winding, embellished mark was gone from her visage, replaced by his own. Fen'harel did not relish the sight of his mark upon the faces of others, even slaves, but it was necessary and its tradition predated even his uplifting to the pantheon. Who was he to balk at millennia of ritual?

"And you were always so well liked, garen." The keeper still stood behind him, but Fen'harel could feel the judgment in the old man's eyes upon him. "I can't imagine why she wouldn't trust you. 'God of Deceit' has such a—"

"That is enough, Tameran."

Normally, he would indulge the old keeper's cynicism. But not today. Fen'harel studied the slave still hovering lifelessly before him. A mortal sent physically through the Fade, wielding an anchor as if it were her own. He slipped an arm behind her back and released his spell. Her body crumpled against his and he navigated it easily to the floor.

"There are gentler ways to alter the vallaslin," Tameran remarked.

"She needed to learn."


End file.
